English

Length of Course : One year

 Year 9 is the third year of the three year Key Stage 3 English programme

 Course description

The course is a combined literature and language course. Language objective are organised into four main areas of English. These comprise the four language strands:  reading,  writing,  listening  and  speaking,  and  language  study.  The literature course is aimed at exposing students to a wide variety of texts covering different literary genres. The course aims to provide progression and continuity so students are prepared to move on to their two year IGCSE courses in Language and Literature. The broad aims are to help students to:

Read   and   understand   complex   and   abstract   ideas   beyond   their personal experience

 Recognise the writer’s viewpoint, attitude and intention

Understand and appreciate ways in which English is changing and how language is used for different effects

  Write in a variety of styles moulding language for effect

 Competently use a range of punctuation and vocabulary

 Reflect and talk about different genres

Argue a point of view with appropriate supportive detail

Empathise with a character and speak in role

  Interpret, analyse and evaluate attitudes, assumptions and arguments

 Main aims

Building on the student’s subject knowledge from previous years. Developing their interpersonal skills, communication, decision making abilities. Students will be able to reflect and evaluate their work and make appropriate decisions to improve and  refine  their  ideas.  Through  the  units  of  work  students  will  develop  their physical theatre skills and explore some stock characters. Using a stimulus will allow students to make creative decisions and experience the process of creating and developing their own performance piece. Scripted work will give the students an opportunity to interpret a character and rehearse it through to a performance.

Students  will  make  connections  from  one  experience  to  another  and  make informed choices based on their knowledge of the course and their abilities.

Contents

The focus will be on the appreciation of the writer’s craftsmanship and its impact on shaping meaning. Thematic, formal and stylistic links and variations between texts and an understanding of the impact of cultural contexts on texts will form an important part of this study. In addition to empathy and discursive responses, students will write their own poems and stories in different forms and styles.

 Language work will include:

·   Writing to persuade, argue, analyse and reflect

·   Study of how the choice of form, layout and presentation contribute to effect in a writing project on media;

·   Revision and reinforcement of informative, descriptive, creative, discursive and analytical writing

·   Vocabulary enhancement, with special attention to usage

Course outcomes

Attainment/assessment targets

Reading

Students will 

ability to make a personal, critical response on a range of texts and recognise how authors achieve their effects through the use of linguistic, structural and presentational devices

Select and synthesise information from a variety of sources

Relate texts to their social, cultural and historical traditions

Writing

Students will:

Write with confidence showing appropriate and imaginative choices of style in a range of forms

 Develop character and setting in narrative writing and coherently present clear points of view in non-fiction writing

Use grammatical features and vocabulary accurately and effectively; use paragraphing and punctuation to make the sequence of events or ideas coherent and clear to the reader

 Present work neatly and legibly

Speaking and Listening

Students will

Use standard English confidently in a range of situations adapting as necessary

Structure talk clearly, using apt vocabulary and appropriate intonation  and emphasis in a range of contexts

Types of assessment

A combination of formative and summative assessments will be used. NC levels will be based on a variety of tasks covering a range of skills. This will be a combination of home and class assignments. GCSE-style exam questions will be set for the progress/end-of-year exams to bridge the transition between KS3 and KS4.

Methodology

Use of multi-media

Independent research by students

Oral Presentations

Debates, Group and panel discussions on relevant issues

Dramatisation of scenes from texts

Cross curricular links

 Texts and Materials

Novel - 'Of Mice and Men' by John Steinbeck

Shakespeare - Romeo and Juliet

Poetry - The unit includes conflict poetry from modern voices alongside classic works by poets such as Tennyson and Owen